Saying goodbye to a changing Russia – Correspondent

It’s true that Russia, and especially Moscow, can be a tough and frankly life-sapping place to live. The seemingly endless winter that begins in the sheer misery of the soggy November darkness; the sometimes inexplicably abrupt behaviour of people in public life; the traffic jams that turn any outing into an operation requiring military planning.

But as I travelled through Siberia on a valedictory journey and took stock of the memories from five-and-a-half years of living in this vast and often contradictory nation, I realised I could not imagine anywhere more enthralling on earth.